Bearers of the Black Staff: Legends of Shannara (11 page)

His thoughts drifted randomly, as thoughts will do, to memories of his early years, before he carried the black staff, before his predecessor sought him out and told him he was the one who was meant to carry
it next, before he was anything but a boy not as old as Panterra Qu was now. It was a long time ago, both in years and experience, and much he could just barely remember. But there was one memory that he kept, one that he would never lose. It surfaced unexpectedly now and then, a long slow teasing of what might have been if he had taken another path than the one he was on. Life would have been so different. Everything would have been changed.

He gazed off into the distance, seeing not the landscape but the promise of something he had let pass by.

There was a girl …

He sensed the creature an instant before it attacked him, his instincts warning him as they always did, if only barely this time. The beast catapulted out of the rocks like a juggernaut set loose on a steep downhill run, all speed and bulk and power as it came at him. He brought up the black staff, runes blazing to life in response, a protection that reacted more quickly than thought. His magic surged about him in a shield that kept him from being trampled into the earth and instead resulted in a glancing blow that flung him twenty feet to one side. He struck the ground with stunning force, but scrambled up anyway, fighting to orient himself as the creature swung back around.

Sider Ament roared at it as he fought to bring his magic to bear, but the creature was on him too quickly, and he managed only to keep his defenses in place long enough to save his life for a second time. The creature, a thousand pounds if it weighed an ounce, caught him up with its lowered head and threw him again. This time he slammed into the hardwood trunk and branches of an oak and dropped like a stone. Pain lanced through his left side, and he could feel rib bones crack. He only barely managed to hang on to the staff. Nausea swept through him, followed by a hot searing agony that caused him to cry out.

He was a fool, he thought, struggling to rise, making it to one knee. The creature had done exactly what he had warned himself it might. Sensing that it was being followed—or perhaps catching sight of him at some point in his pursuit—it had circled back and waited in ambush. He had aided the beast in its efforts by allowing his attention to wander. He had allowed himself to think of her, when thinking of her was always dangerous, always and always …

The creature struck again, and his thoughts scattered. Whipping the black staff about so that one blunt end pointed directly at his attacker, he sent a sharp burst of magic exploding into its muzzle. The beast barely slowed. Shaking off the attack, grunting in a heavy rumble that generated deep in its belly, it lowered its head further and came on. Sider watched through the screen of his pain and desperation, knowing he lacked strength enough to stop it.

In the final seconds before the creature reached him, he shrugged off his backpack, struggled the rest of the way up, and staggered two steps to his right to find what protection he could behind the huge oak, then used the staff to generate clouds of black smoke and fire to try to confuse his attacker.

He knew even as he tried this final ruse that it wasn’t enough. The beast was too big and too enraged to be turned aside. Enveloped in smoke and the thunder of its charge, it brushed off Sider’s defenses, shattered the oak tree, caught him with its snout and tossed him.

The last thing he remembered after that was the strange sound of multiple explosions. One, two, three in quick succession. There was rage and pain in the huffing roar that the beast emitted, and it seemed to him that the sounds were all one and all right on top of him.

Then he lost consciousness and didn’t hear anything more.

H
E IS FIFTEEN YEARS OLD AND LIVING IN THE HIGH
country with his parents and his younger brother, the family home settled below the snow line but not so close to the communities that they have to worry about more than occasional contact with other people. No one comes into the high country save trappers and hunters, and these people keep to themselves. It is the way his parents like things; company is welcome when invited but not otherwise encouraged.

He does not know what has fostered this attitude, but he accepts it as reasonable. His parents are good and kind people, but they like living apart. They are self-sufficient folk content with their own company. On some days, they exchange barely two dozen words between dawn and dusk. They assign him chores and responsibilities and expect him to follow through. He is as reliable and self-sufficient as they are. He does not need minding and prefers his own company. He seldom fails to do what is asked of him.

The hunters and trappers who come by now and then sometimes stop but more often do no more than wave as they pass. Everyone living in the
high country knows everyone else; there are few enough of them that it isn’t hard. They look out for one another in a haphazard sort of way, mostly when it is convenient and they think to do so. No one expects anything more. Self-sufficiency is a code of living that all embrace and accept.

It is a good life.

Now and then, he is dispatched to the villages of Glensk Wood or Calling Wells for supplies the members of the family cannot fashion or grow on their own. A trip to one of the villages happens perhaps once a month in good weather, less in bad. It has become his task to make these trips; he is good at bartering and cautious in his dealings. When he is sent to procure something, he is usually successful. Because he is less annoyed by the communities and their larger populations than are his parents, he is not unhappy about being sent. He finds that although he is happy living alone, he likes people, too. He comes to know a handful of those who live on the valley floor, and a very few become his friends.

One of them is a girl.

He meets her by accident, just a few days shy of his fourteenth birthday, while walking home from Glensk Wood. She is coming down the trail as he is going up, and when he sees her he thinks his heart will stop beating and never start up again. She is tall and strong and beautiful, and he has never seen anyone like her. He slows without thinking, captivated for reasons he will never be able to fully explain, but she seems not to notice. She approaches, nods a greeting, and passes by. She does not say a word. She does not look back as she walks away.

He knows because he looks back at her.

It is several weeks before he is able to return to Glensk Wood, and then only because he finds an excuse that will hide his real purpose in going. He does not know the girl’s name. He does not know where she lives. But he is confident, in the way young people are, that he will find her. He sets out early, eagerly. He walks quickly to Glensk Wood and then spends several hours looking for her in a random sort of way, thinking that somehow he will stumble on her. When that proves unsuccessful, he begins asking about her, hinting at a business transaction he hopes to conduct. Again, he fails. The day ends, and he is forced to return home knowing nothing more than he did when he came down out of the high country—save one thing.

No matter how long it takes or what he must do, he will find her.

It is another month before he makes a second try. By then he is beginning to believe that he is fooling himself about what is and is not possible. The girl might have been visiting. She might have passed through one time and then gone back to wherever she came from. She might never return. He begins to question his behavior. Thinking it over in a more rational state of mind, he feels both foolish and strangely unsettled. He has never felt this way about anyone. He barely knows any girls his age, and none of them affect him in this way. Why are things so different with this girl? He does not like it that he so obsessed with her when in truth he has no reason for being so.

But still he goes and still he looks, and this time he finds her.

Once again, it happens by accident. He arrives in Glensk Wood not long after sunrise, having set out while it was still dark in order to make the most of his day. He is just passing through the cottages at the north end, not even really looking for her yet, just making his way toward the center of the village, and suddenly there she is. She is standing in a garden digging rows in the freshly hoed earth and planting seedlings for her flowers. He stops at the edge of the stone pathway leading to her doorway and watches, not sure what he should do next.

After a moment, without looking up from her work, she says, “Do you prefer azaleas or sweet peas?”

He hesitates. “Azaleas are the more hardy, sweet peas the more fragrant.”

He cannot believe he has just said this. He knows almost nothing about flowers and does not have strong feelings one way or the other about most of them. He admires them but has seldom voiced any kind of opinion on the matter, even to his mother, who adores them.

“Do you have a garden?” she asks.

“My mother does.”

“Your mother. Where do you live?”

“North of here, just below the snow line.”

“Cold, hard country up there. What brings you to Glensk Wood?”

He hesitates once more. “Errands.”

“Errands,” she repeats, and now she looks up. She has long, honey-blond hair, startling green eyes, and fine strong features. “Is it possible that I am mistaken about you? Are you really come here only for the purpose of running errands?”

He swallows what he is feeling and smiles bravely. “No. I was hoping to find you.”

She smiles. “That’s a much better answer. It is best to be direct with me. Anyway, I saw it in your eyes that time we met on the trail. So you don’t need to pretend.”

He shakes his head, confused and embarrassed. “I wasn’t … wasn’t really …”

She stands now. She is tall, almost as tall as he is. “To be here at this hour, you must have left your home very early. Would you like to come inside and have something to eat and drink? My parents aren’t home. We could talk.”

She stares right at him as she waits for his answer. Bold and challenging. He finds that there is nothing he wants more than to accept her invitation, but he is not sure he should do that.

“We could talk out here,” he says, trying to hold her gaze.

She studies him a moment, perhaps wondering if he is worth the effort. Then she marches across to where he stands and takes him by the arm.

“We could,” she says. “But we aren’t going to.”

He allows himself to be steered toward the cottage. He is surprised to discover that her grip on his arm is very strong.

“Are you afraid of me?” she asks him suddenly.

He shrugs and manages a quick grin. “I think you already know the answer to that.”

She returns the grin. “You’re right. I do.”

S
IDER AMENT REGAINED AWARENESS SLOWLY
. He rose out of his slumber in a lethargic waking that seemed to take forever. But the pain and his memories of what had brought him to this state helped speed his efforts, and mustering what strength of body and will he could, he dragged himself back into consciousness.

He opened his eyes and looked around.

The first thing he saw was the corpse of his attacker, head thrown back and body blown open and bloodied. He stared at it a moment,
trying to make sense of what he was seeing, to imagine what sort of weapon could do such damage.

Then he noticed the splints and bandages that wrapped various parts of his own body. His tattered gray robes had been cut away in several places, exposing part of his torso and his damaged left arm. The bulk of his pain seemed centered on those two places in particular, but the rest of him had not been spared.

His pack lay to one side, untouched.

His right hand still gripped his black staff.

“Awake at last, are you?” a voice boomed. “Welcome back to the land of the living!”

A man moved into view from behind him. He was big and powerfully built, face bronzed by sun and wind, his features crosshatched with scars and his hands missing several fingers. It was difficult to determine his age, but he had clearly seen the years of his youth come and go a while back. He was dressed in black, his clothing a mix of thick leather and heavy metal fastenings, the material as scarred and beaten as he was.

He smiled cheerfully at Sider and knelt down next to him, tangled black hair falling down about his face. “I thought maybe you wouldn’t wake up. I thought maybe my bandaging job wasn’t enough to save you.”

Sider wet his lips. “Good enough, thanks. Do you have any water?”

The big man rose and walked back to where the other couldn’t see him, then returned carrying a soft leather pouch. He held it up to Sider’s lips and let the water trickle down his throat. “Just a little,” he said. “Until I’m sure your injuries aren’t worse than what they seem, we don’t want to rush things.”